Radical Notion
by Alby Mangroves
Summary: Eames thinks he's seen everything. Everything, that is, except inside of Arthur's head. Arthur/Eames, Slash, Romance, NC-17.
1. The Hunch

Thanks Detochkina and Miss_Winkles for casting their eye over this. Well, eyes. All of them. This is an AU story, which takes place loosely within the Fischer job timeline.

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"...Arthur tells me it can't be done."

"Hmm, Arthur. You're still working with that stick in the mud," Eames hears himself saying, the smoky, hot air of Mombasa suddenly tangy with excitement.

Somewhere close by a car backfires, and Eames finds this to be a perfectly suitable metaphor for what just happened in his brain.

As is always the case with these things, his helpful mind calls up immaculate stitching over silk, the slightest pull of fabric around neat buttons, buffed leather and pinstripes, all slick, slick, slick. He is a master forger after all; his mind retains what it must, eating detail the way a black hole eats matter: relentlessly.

But, despite the crowding with all that minutiae, inside Eames' mind it's clean. Sparse.

Inside, it's... _Hmm, Arthur_.

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When the team assembles, it's lovely—they're all professionals except for the architect, but she seems all right as far as complete novices go. He and Arthur nod curtly at each other across the unfathomable ocean that is the warehouse. As is his way, Eames' eyes flit over the whole tableau as though Arthur's just part of it, a segment of the scene to be memorized. He rests his gaze on everything for mere moments before moving on, while Arthur's hard eyes stab like knives, but glance off his armor.

A sense of buzzing excitement burns low in Eames' belly, and he puts it down to the thrill of the job, with the added bonus which comes with all Cobb's jobs: annoying the shit out of bloody _Arthur_.

Eames can't really explain his fascination. It might be that Arthur looks elegant even when he's falling on his arse. Eames watches this with great pleasure, again and again, as they test the effectiveness of the kick under sedation. There's something poetic about Arthur's immaculately dressed arse meeting the floor. It's rather like watching a pretty bird smacking into a window, and it's always fascinated Eames to see pretty things brought low.

It might be that Arthur is a walking, talking containment unit. Eames doesn't know what's inside there, but he wants to. Oh, how he wants to. Alas, no matter how he ruffles Arthur's feathers, how he needles, Arthur never really shows any sign of cracking. Whatever's inside Arthur's sharply-dressed, very fit outside, has so far proven impenetrable. Eames' eyebrow quirks while looking at that unbreached exterior as he congratulates himself on a pun well done.

That's not to say that Arthur doesn't display emotion, it's just that it's nothing more interesting than general disapproval and mild annoyance, where Eames always hopes for something immediate and burning hot, maybe rage or disgust. _Christ_, maybe even both.

He continues to try, though. When it comes down to it, he rather enjoys attempting to unsettle Arthur. It's a big part of the reason he always accepts Cobb's jobs, and it's not the cash; Eames is old money. Flapping Arthur's unflappable demeanour makes it _fun,_ and everyone knows it's good for the spirit to enjoy one's work.

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Eames always trusts a hunch. He's a gut-feel kind of man, so when he senses something, a strange undercurrent, his ears—the actual _and_ the proverbial—perk up.

The hunch could be nothing at all, except for the slight incline of Arthur's sleek head. A tiny movement, nothing more, in response to Cobb and Ariadne discussing the complexities of their unique type of design—just enough to ping Eames' _Hello, what's this?_ radar.

At first, Eames simply thinks Arthur is interested in the conversation, but almost immediately, he realizes this isn't the case. It seems Arthur's tiny spark of interest flared right after Cobb and Ariadne made plans to continue their discussion while eating out. _Eating Out, _Eames' brain chimes, _Eating Out, Out, Out._

Ergo, here is Eames, on a bloody stake-out (how gauche) in an alley opposite the dormant workshop, having watched Cobb and Ariadne leave for dinner. It's only three minutes later that Arthur skulks in from the nightscape and lets himself in, and Eames' stomach flips like a pancake, even as he reluctantly gives the little sleek bastard a pursed-lip nod for not wasting his time for bloody hours.

He waits five more minutes before going in, too.

The place is deserted, silent. Eames' shoes scuff quietly on the dusty concrete floors as he wanders around inside the warehouse. In the dark, he checks out this and that, like a cat in the night. He navigates Cobb's workshop slowly, noting the eerie crawl of the residual glow of street lamps outside.

He makes his way in with his hands in his pockets like he's just larking about, all just-on-a-stroll, nonchalant on the balls of his feet, not really hiding his presence but not announcing it either. His ludicrously expensive wallet lies out of the way under his chair where he'd tucked it right before they all left for the night, giving himself a perfect excuse for breaking in, should Cobb return sooner than expected.

Whatever Arthur is doing, he's not advertising it either. He hasn't turned on any lights, and it's as quiet as a tomb inside. Eames walks on, searching.

It doesn't take long.

Arthur's in a recliner tucked into a darkened corner at the back, the PASIV whispering and ticking along beside him. A thick blanket covers him against the night chill, but the shape of him is unmistakable, all long and hard angles like he never grew out of being seventeen.

Eames creeps closer, puffs of dust grinding under his heels, close enough to see the countdown on the PASIV, which reads at just over five minutes. He watches Arthur's sleeping face and his mind draws the patterns unwittingly, tracing over jaw and nose and brows. He reduces the shapes of Arthur's face to geometry, wondering what Arthur's doing in there with a good hour of dream time, _in there _where Eames can't reach him.

Of course, the moment he thinks _that_, he's fucked, because there is curious, and then there is Eames.

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**A/N:** Thanks for reading, both of you.


	2. The Seed

No Betas were harmed (much) in the making of this chapter. Detka and Winks looked over it, and then I promptly went and rewrote most of it, just to see if they're paying attention.

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_He reduces the shapes of Arthur's face to geometry, wondering what Arthur's doing in there with a good hour of dream time, in there where Eames can't reach him._

_Of course, the moment he thinks that, he's fucked, because there is curious, and then there is Eames._

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"No, for the love of God, I do not want to buy a chicken!" Eames shouts over the din of the marketplace, nudging aside the Asian woman and her squawking poultry, and bulldozing his way onward through the crowds.

The place is absolutely packed full of- well, every bloody thing, and the sun's right in his eyes, blinding him and washing out the way forward in hazy smears of noon.

He pushes on, wondering how he'll find anything here, how the hell he'll find Arthur in this- what the hell is this place, anyway? Is it a construct? An organic dream?

Is he running freerange in Arthur's head, with no parameters at all?

It seems unlikely that Arthur would create something like this Chinatown marketplace, so busy with noise and sweat and colour where Eames half expected the boring hotel they'd been working on, or perhaps- no. Eames can't even come up with any other scenario, _that's_ how bloody predictable Arthur is.

Except, he's obviously not. Huh.

Whatever the setting, he'd almost hoped for a stylish-if slightly repressed-Arthur just begging to have his immaculate hair mussed in a headlock, something Eames might only ever get to do in dreamshare.

Eames would have made sure Arthur's nose was in optimum position to nestle right into Eames' armpit.

Then again, some good old fashioned dirty talk would have been nice, maybe starting with bringing the size of Arthur's gun into question, though it would undoubtedly be a nice, stylish gun. Good times.

Well, on second thought, perhaps not the headlock- Eames is pretty sure Arthur would actually just shoot him in the face.

He grins and keeps walking.

But, here he is in a pulsing, thriving place, with nothing so much as resembling Arthur in sight.

It appears that Eames won't be able to gleefully rub his hands together after all, secure in the knowledge he'd been proven right about the stuffy little prat.

He would be upset about this, if it weren't so exciting to be proven wrong- it's now entirely possible that Arthur is interesting after all.

This place, this loud, horridly fantastic, pedestrian place seems like the antithesis of silent, watchful Arthur, really.

Oh yes, Eames is very pleasantly surprised.

He follows his nose through the market, ducking the low-flying pennants and dodging insistent vendors until he clears the worst of it, striding out into the open among a more sedate crowd.

It's vivid, this place, incredibly alive, and at one point, Eames stops and just spins casually on his heel, panning and mapping the entire vista of Arthur's surprisingly exciting, exotic dream.

He's absolutely thrilled to have snuck in here like a robber-which... ok, yeah, he is- and to be taking away this vignette of Arthur's psyche for further study and in-depth analysis when he's back topside.

A student of humanity's foibles, is Eames.

The daylight wanes, or at least it feels as though it does as Eames peruses the place one more time, still uncertain which direction to take.

It comes to him then, that a place like this is perfect to lose oneself- to meander through until the skin of your disguise sloughs off with the scrape of human traffic, and you come out the other end a new man.

He stands perfectly still for just a moment, thinking what it would be like to be Arthur, here in this place, shucking off his perfectly groomed exterior to become-

And that's when Eames sees it. The light turns eerie, a strange blue sheen to the noonday sun and to the left, an alley looms.

Cobblestones lead the way off into the narrow channel, which seems a little darker than it should feasibly be in this scenario.

Before he's even aware of moving, Eames' feet carry him straight into the mouth of it, until he feels physically swallowed by the cool darkness within.

This is the place, all right.

Leaving the noise of the marketplace behind, he walks on, eyes wide and panning, not much room either side, but he looks back and forward and up at the fire escapes, mapping it all for later.

The light dims further, until there is barely any illumination at all, and Eames slows down, the atmosphere lending itself to being furtive—something he is exceptionally good at.

The walls are irregular red clinker brick, like this place was built in the depression using salvaged materials and not at all like it was created by Arthur's presumably well-ordered brain.

Everything feels close, and tight, and oppressively weighed down, like he's underwater.

The air is thicker here, and suddenly Eames is working to pull it through his lungs where it seems to stick to his ribs rather than help him breathe.

He finds himself facing a dead-end, and he's just about to turn back when something catches his eye; there's movement up above the dark alley.

Eames stays in the shadows and watches, waiting for his eyes to adjust to the strange horror-movie atmosphere.

This place is something else, injected with dense intent, which just seems so out of kilter with Arthur's sensibilities, Eames can't even begin to understand why he'd be dreaming something so secretive, and brimming with a kind of undercurrent, a rip.

Risking exposure, Eames creeps a little further, tucking himself into a doorway.

And there, he makes a discovery.

A story above, Arthur is half swallowed by darkness, but it's unmistakably his well-dressed shoulders, his arse, his buffed leather shoes, gleaming absurdly against the dirty, worn brick and creaky metal girders of the fire escape.

Arthur's arms are straining with the effort of pinning someone to a recessed doorway, both figures partly obscured in the scant light, but there can be no doubt what Eames holds witness to.

Arthur is in the midst of a romantic tryst.

Darkness drifts over Arthur's slim shoulders like silk, and he holds a projection's hand in his, pressing his mouth over the palm and the inside of the wrist, then turning it this way and that so he can kiss the knuckles and slowly lave between the fingers.

His tongue licks along the palm of his lover's hand, and something inside Eames clenches wetly.

He follows Arthur's flicking tongue with utter fascination as it weaves its moist path over pulse and vein and muscle. Eames marvels that neat, stiff Arthur is capable of this kind of intuitive, subjective, toe-curling passion. He knows he's staring, intruding, but he can't move except to dig fingers into palms and grit his teeth together to prevent sounds.

Then, Arthur's whole body gets behind it; Eames can see him flexing, rolling his hips slowly, rhythmically into the projection.

It's mesmerizing—his tension, his measured intent—and Eames can't look away from the pull of tailored trousers across Arthur's buttocks as he grinds his pelvis with equal parts restraint and deliberation. Bracing back with one leg, Arthur forces the other between his lover's thighs, and Eames is dry-mouthed, his eyes huge with this discovery of Arthur taking and wanting and affected—as he has never seen him before, as he has never consciously considered him.

Deliciously filthy sounds sweep Eames' mind clean and his chest is too tight, the darkness sweeping in.

They're kissing now, Arthur's head moving softly, inclined just so, and Eames can tell it's the kind of kissing that turns you inside out, wet and swollen and completely immersive.

The kind of kissing that's just like fucking.

_Oh God._

Eames swallows so dryly, it's like a handful of sand has been sifted down his throat.

When Arthur finds the door handle and pushes them through into the building's dark embrace, Eames is already on the way out, with all of Arthur's marketplace projections staring at him impassively, recording his failed infiltration.

He runs until he wakes, then walks fast and hard from the workshop, not looking back, with his totem clasped in his sweaty hand, something loose thrashing heavily around in his chest.

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**A/N:** Thanks for reading! I think there are like, four of us now. I'm warm and glowy :)


	3. The LIght

No Betas were harmed in the making of this chapter. Apologies in advance for everything. Ever.

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_When Arthur finds the door handle and pushes them through into the building's dark embrace, Eames is already on the way out, with all of Arthur's marketplace projections staring at him impassively, recording his failed infiltration._

_He runs until he wakes, then walks fast and hard from the workshop, not looking back, with his totem clasped in his sweaty hand, something loose thrashing heavily around in his chest._

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For two nights, Eames watches Arthur sneak back into the workshop and stay no longer than twenty or thirty minutes at a time, and only when the place is deserted.

Cobb and Ariadne have taken to dining out together more often than not. Eames would be wondering what exactly is going on _there_, except his brain is so full of the shape of Arthur's tongue licking the lust from between a projection's fingers that there's absolutely no room for anything else.

Each night, Eames sneaks inside the workshop after Arthur, and then sits beside him, watching him dream and torturing himself imagining the visions might be playing out inside.

He didn't know he was a masochist, but here we are.

On the third occasion after gate-crashing Arthur's dream, something wonderful takes place in the quiet, eerie warehouse, with Eames the only witness.

Arthur has, as usual, covered himself with a blanket (_why do you do that,_ he wants to ask), which Eames rolls back gently so he can freely roam—albeit only with eyes—the pleasing, lean lines of Arthur's body.

And there, sitting in the dark silence interrupted only by the rhythmic sighing of the PASIV, Eames' eyes widen in surprise as he watches the shape of Arthur's dick harden and tent under those immaculate trousers, straining along the zipper and pulling the pockets suggestively, deliciously out of shape.

This latest development is an unexpected but smashing fringe benefit, an erotic gratuity. Eames is absolutely delighted at witnessing Arthur's hard-on thicken into life, watching it swell beneath constraints of pants and trousers.

Eames' lips glisten as he grins at himself for being such a lewd slag.

Then, his grin fades, and he swallows dryly, blinking like he just walked out of a dark tunnel into blinding sunlight.

Blink. Blink... oh.

_Oh._

So.

_This_ is why. This is why he's been coming back to sit here, haunting Arthur like a wraith. Even his body knew it before his brain kicked in, all tense and pent up and so bloody aggressive lately.

It's right there, plain as the stiff dick in his own pants. With a bit of a shock, Eames realizes that _fuck, he wants Arthur. _

He really, _really wants _Arthur.

Rather a peeve, that.

Oh, but look at him. So pretty and perfect- not a whit of him wasted. Spare and tight and lean. Everything so elegant and precise, from his smooth face and slick hair, right down to his well-turned ankles. Everything so bloody neat. He looks like a fucking dancer, sliding stylishly through life while the rest of them bumble around, impaling themselves on sharp edges of heartbreak and falling into ditches of debt and mediocrity.

Eames looks Arthur over with wonder, feeling so desperate to touch him that it hurts not to.

He won't, though.

He can't.

He'd never breach their professional trust so far as that. And yes, the lie is right there on the surface but it's conveniently deniable at the moment (he can absolutely still refute any claims that he's been here at all, and do it with a completely straight face, too), but it won't be if he goes any further.

Out of habit, he looks at the timer, realizing with regret that it's time to go. He covers Arthur with the blanket, unfolding it gently over his body, then quietly sneaks out of the workshop.

He fights the whimsy of Paris weather all the way back to the hotel, shoulders hunched and collar up against the wet wind. He barely makes it through the door, bursting into his room in a flurry of frigid hands, slipped-off coat, and wind-blown hair.

He skids into the bathroom undoing his flies, takes out his fattening cock and leans up on the vanity, wanking like a man possessed right over the sink, imagining Arthur's tongue doing to his balls what it was doing to the projection's hand. It feels like wrestling, this hot, sudden urge to be violent with himself, to bring himself off with harsh, blunt strokes, and to do it before his arm seizes up in a cramp.

He imagines himself with his face between Arthur's thighs, nostrils flaring with the musk of him right in the crease of leg and scrotum, the texture of him, the fucking _taste_, and _God_, it doesn't take long. In fact, it's embarrassingly bloody fast, but who could help it with everything so beautifully fine and long _and fuck,_ Arthur is _hot _under his eyelids, hotter even than his dick in his hand.

Eames shudders, fancying that more than he can even _think,_ let alone say, surprised at the vehemence of it, at the near brutality of the violently swirling lust, deep and low in his gut. He comes in hot streaks into the sink, imagining Arthur laid out just right with his thighs spread wide.

"Oh my God," he pants, searching for himself in the vanity's mirror but finding a ruddy-faced, wild-eyed stranger instead.

Surprisingly, for all the drama and rush and the boil of his blood, completion feels remarkably hollow.

Maybe next time he'll imagine Arthur with a gun. No, TWO guns.

Maybe he'll—

And that's when he realizes it won't do.

Nothing will do, but the real thing.

"Ah, fuck you, Arthur," he grinds out, resentful, washing sticky mess from between his fingers, wishing like hell he could turn off his brain, once so sharp and useful and suddenly as florid as a teen tart's bedroom.

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He doesn't know why he continues to do it. It would be just as easy to wander out into the street and find someone to blow him for twenty quid. Hell, he could go to a bar and pick up a twink with less fuss than toasting those disgusting hot pockets Ariadne loves so much.

Instead, Eames is painfully hard against the zipper of his pants as he watches Arthur dreaming, again and again, only to sneak out just before the PASIV calls time.

It's driving him bonkers, knowing that Arthur is in there doing _that_, literally fucking in his head. It's such an outrageous play for this person whom he thought he'd worked out years ago. And that's it in a nutshell- Arthur might be neat, he might be predictable, but it appears that Eames was wrong about a fundamental fact. Arthur does indeed appear to have an imagination, and he's not afraid to use it.

At some point, Eames has stopped annoying Arthur. He doesn't become aware of it until one day he looks up, and he's forgotten how. Arthur sits beside him scribbling on his note pad, and Eames wants to bump his chair to make his pen skid, or stand up abruptly and get right in his space to piss him off with a little stick-up-the-arse innuendo but when he goes to do it, the urge is no longer spontaneous, no longer fun.

He watches Arthur for long moments like he wants to see whatever movie's projecting on the inside of his skull, until that sleek head lifts and flinty eyes cut him up into quivering hunks of horny meat.

Eames gives him the briefest of smirks, an illusion that he is still himself, then turns away pretending he's not chewing the skin off of the inside of his mouth.

He's losing his game, and it's all because of bloody Arthur, whom he is really starting to resent.

_It will blow over_, he thinks_. Just need time to bleach my brain_, he thinks, but even as he attempts to convince himself, he knows he will fail.

Eames doesn't forget. He _can't_. It's against his very nature.

Every time he looks at Arthur's straight, lean back, he imagines it stretched out and rolling, with that one slim leg bracing back for more leverage. Every time his eyes find Arthur, he waits on the pink dart of his tongue to dance along with the words he's about to speak.

Which is bizarre, because he's never really been interested in what Arthur's had to _say_ before.

And that's when Eames realizes he's completely, utterly fucked.

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Hello!


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